The Alignments and How Not To Play Them

The alignment system in Pathfinder is pretty broad when you get to thinking about it. What makes us lawful or good can be pretty varied. Because of this, I would never imagine on telling you how to play a certain alignment, only what alignment you probably are. If you want a really good idea on what alignment your character is, take this test as if you were your character. I’ve found it to be pretty accurate.

What makes a character an alignment? Is it what he says? What he does? I find neither are quite true. It’s the intentions BEHIND your actions that define your personality and alignment. After all, if you do good things that doesn’t make you a good person. If you give money to charity to help others then that’s a good action, but if you just give money to charity to boost your standing among the rich, then that’s a neutral action. If you kill someone in cold blood to take their stuff, then that’s evil, but if you kill them in cold blood because if they live they’ll cause the death of millions, that’s a neutral or even good act.

Law and Chaos

Lawful and chaotic suffer less from this as your intentions are usually based on a desire for order or impulse. Lawfulness does not mean to strictly adhere to laws, though it could. However if you adhere to laws so much that you’ll punish someone for even a minor infraction, you’re probably playing Lawful Stupid and need to stop (more on that later). A lawful person is someone who believes in order and discipline. A lawful person tends to follow his head over his heart, think things out ahead of time, and adhere to tradition.

This isn’t to say a lawful person is uncaring, or less caring than a chaotic person, but they may be able to set aside their feelings on a matter if it benefited their goals in the long-term. (This is also a way in which paladins fall, ignoring too many bad things for the greater good). This is also not to say lawful types are smarter than chaotic. Just because you think things through ahead of time doesn’t mean you think things through the right way. For example, you see an evil band of orcs attacking a town. You plan ahead and think that sneaking up on them is a good idea. After all, you can’t hit what you can’t see. Thing is, you forgot that your group was a bunch of heavy armor wearing thugs and couldn’t sneak up on a deaf cow.

Lawfulness does have its downsides, such as being close-minded, resistant to change, self-righteousness, and lack of adaptability. This doesn’t mean EVERY lawful person is this way, but most possess at least one of these flaws.

Chaotic people tend to follow their hearts (or good or evil) over their heads. They follow whatever whim strikes them, if it’s appropriate. If you do WHATEVER strikes your fancy with no regards to anyone, or start playing yourself as insane (like you decide to pee on the wizard because you can) you’re playing Chaotic Stupid and need to stop (more on this later). This doesn’t mean chaotic people don’t think their decisions through, they’re just more likely to act on impulse. The’re also excellent at adaption and improvisation. Again, this doesn’t mean lawful types AREN’T, just that chaotic types tend to be better at it (keyword is ‘tend to be’). Take the orc example from before, a Chaotic warrior might see them, get upset and charge head first. Doing this he runs into the traps the orcs set and gets impaled or he might see the traps and change plans on a whim, turning his frontal assault into a bluff. However, even a chaotic and impulsive character usually won’t charge an angry dragon (unless they have suitable protection, like three feet of steel protecting them).

Chaos has its downsides as well such as recklessness, fickle behavior, irresponsible behavior, and perhaps authority issues. Again, not all chaotic people have these issues but they usually have one of said flaws.

Remember: You are not an outsider, you are humanoid. Only outsiders of those planes (Heaven, Maelstrom, Abaddon, etc) act in the extreme of their alignment and even then not always. Even a Lawful Good paladin of the god of Lawful Good paladins might embrace some aspects of chaos. Even the most pure hearted person might have a dark side or dark thoughts. Evil characters can care and love others and chaotic characters can have a sense of honor and loyalty.

Alignment Traps

Here are the traps many players fall into with certain alignments (a lot of this is taken from tvtropes.com. They’ve got really good insights on alignments here):

Lawful Stupid (or Lawful Jerk)

Also known as Lawful Anal, these people may call themselves Lawful Good, but seem to completely forget about the “Good” part. Rather, they lean toward such rigid adherence to the law that anybody who breaks any law, anywhere, for any reason, is the enemy. Even saying an unkind word to someone is an act of pure evil, and the Lawful Stupid can and will act as Judge, Jury, and Executioner. They refuse to hide from even overwhelming threats, and believe that letting evil win in any way (by, say, helping the villagers to retreat from the advancing dark army) is against their alignment. Naturally, they are too stupid to be evil; that is why they are called Lawful Stupid, not Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral. (this was copied word for word from here because frankly they did it better than I could).

Chaotic Stupid

Chaotic Stupid believes that they have to embrace chaos to it’s fullest. They act, for the lack of a better word, insane. If they met a dog on the street, they might pet it, kick it, paint it purple, ignore it, or act like it. Think Marvel’s Deadpool. They follow their impulses so much they ignore any and all survival instincts humans have. They’ll charge straight into a dragon’s mouth, run into obvious ambushes, and otherwise act as if they were a hero sans brains.

Chaotic Jerk

This is what I call those who abuse the Chaotic Neutral alignment. In games where evil alignments are banned, people will play Chaotic Neutral as if they were an evil character, normally a Stupid Evil character. This includes playing a psychopath, a character who is bloodthirsty, a sadist, or a thief who likes to steal from the party (don’t ever do this as fun as it might sound). A Chaotic Neutral character is just as likely to do something evil as they are something good. However, this can also drift into Neutral Stupid territory.

Neutral Stupid

This alignment is often played by those who want to do evil acts and believe if they do an equal number of good acts, they are still neutral. Most neutral characters aren’t maintainers of balance, but simply people who don’t care one way or another. Actual maintainers of balance may perform evil acts, if they believe them necessary to maintain balance in an area, not because they just did X amount of good acts and now must do X amount of evil. Take a TN druid of balance for example: They may let a city be razed to the ground (and may even help) if they believe that city has grown beyond it’s borders, or if that city has started logging from the druid’s forest too much. They may not like killing innocent people, but they may see them as an overpopulation and the druid must weed them out as they would any overpopulated species. Of course, the druid probably tried other methods before genocide. Likewise, if that city was TOO diminished, the druid may help with reconstruction.

Stupid Good

The Stupid Good character is “good” to the point of being unable to comprehend that someone else might be bad. As such, she’s a friend to all living things, unliving things, and things that ought not live. In short: good, but in a bad way. (Taken from here). This can result in pacifism and trying to be diplomatic even past the point of negotiation. You refuse to see anything as evil, just misunderstood. This can SOMETIMES be good but often results in pain for the party.

Another type of Stupid Good is the good over survival type. It’s a great thing when your paladin is willing to give his life to the cause but not if he’s willing to throw it away for the cause. Overzealousness is just as bad as the previous type of Stupid Good. For example, Wizard Palan Porksbane is in a duel with a wizard far beyond his powers. In Palan’s possession though is a scroll of great evil and is the only way to stop this evil wizard. Palan opens he scroll and a dark being begins to speak to him. Rather than negotiate with the evil being and try to get out of the encounter unscathed, perhaps offering the evil wizard’s life in trade, Palan says “I’m wiling to pay any price to defeat this wizard.” The dark power, pleasantly surprised, possesses Palan’s body and now owns Palan’s right side.